She's Come Undone
by Cyranothe2nd
Summary: How does Hermione deal with being a killer? Takes place after the Final Battle. HGSS implied. PG for language.


Summary: Takes place in Seventh Year after the Final Battle. How will Hermione deal with being a killer?

Disclaimer: I disclaim!

Please R/R.

She's Come Undone 

Hermione wished more than anything that she had died. She _should_ have died. She was no better or braver than Ron or Neville or Parvati. She was just lucky and she hated herself for it.

After the Battle of Hogwarts Hermione was confined to the Infirmary. She bore no scars, as Seamus did. Nor, thankfully, had her ability to perform magic been shattered, like Draco Malfoy's. The scars she bore were deeper than that. She had watched her friends die. She had endured the horror of the Crucio curse at the hands of Bellatrix Lestrange. She had killed and she had made it so that Lucius' son would never again be a threat to her or her kind.

But these actions had taken a toll that could not be seen. If Dumbledore had been alive perhaps he could have found the right thing to say. But he was gone, dead saving Harry so that he could defeat Voldemort. Professor McGonagal had come and asked her to come back to class and so Hermione had gone. She sat in the back of class and watched the remains of her year learn Transfiguration and wondered how they could go on when so many had not. She did not speak anymore. How could she burden others with the things that she had seen and done? Even Harry could never understand and she found herself avoiding him as much as possible.

The only time she felt at ease was when she was in the Potions classroom. She had resumed her duties as Professor Snape's assistant, having finished her NEWT level classes the year before. He would give her a stack of essays to grade and leave her in silence. He never asked her how she was feeling or if she was okay. _Of course I'm not Okay!_ She wanted to shout. But Snape never expected her to act as anything other than what she had become, a shadow of her former self.

For that reason more than any other she sought to please him, to perform the mundane tasks that were necessary without being asked. More than once she had spent the night in his office, alphabetizing or brewing potion bases. She looked for reasons to escape the Gryffindor common room and come to the welcome sanctuary of his classroom. She could sit for hours, reading or simply staring out the window and sometimes he would sit with her in blessed silence and she would feel peace for a few precious hours.

It was that peace she sought now. It was a few minutes after midnight and she had awoken from another nightmare. She shrugged on a robe and stood at the foot of her bed. She had never gone down to his dungeon office this later before. But then, she could not go to anyone else. And she could not bear to be alone. She felt like she was flying apart. Mind made up, Hermione opened the door to her room and walked quickly down the back staircase. As Head Girl she was allowed to be in the halls at any hour of the day or night. Still, it wouldn't do to be seen. It would create awkward questions and she would be obliged to speak.

Hermione slipped down the chipped stone stairs to the Potions Master's office. She did not shiver in the cold, or indeed notice it at all. She did not knock on the door but simply slid it open and stole inside. Hermione remembered another time when she had slipped in this door, to steal supplies for a Polyjuice potion. That seemed like a lifetime ago.

Snape was there of course. He did not turn when she entered but remained in his chair, staring into the fire. Hermione studied his profile by the glowing half-light. The War had not been kind to him either. He had seen many of his friends die. He had killed Lucius Malfoy himself, and become a war hero in the process. But death had taken a toll on him, just as it had on her. He no longer growled at his students. He no longer terrorized the halls. He had grown quiet. It was that quiet that Hermione found herself craving. She felt oftentimes that her own emotions seethed just under the surface and it would only take a casual word or gesture to send them spilling over.

Hermione approached Snape's chair and knelt down next to him, staring as he did, into the fire. Memories filled her up, numbing her senses. She remembered her screams as Bellatrix Lestrange performed the Crucio curse. She remembered the pain twisting in her, worse than anything she could ever imagine. She remembered the savage pleasure on the woman's face as she had spoken the curse over and over. And then, for in one brief flash, Hermione got a clear view of her twisted face and she struck and killed the bitch. And for an instant, just an instant, she had felt triumph and a horrible sense of satisfaction. She had looked down into the cold, dead face of her enemy and could have laughed.

The thought that she could take pleasure in another's death was horrifying. The memory of it filled her, stretching her until she felt she must burst or die. She felt a sob claw at her throat and from behind her she felt Snape reach out a hand and place it on her shoulder.

It was the touch that undid her. She flew apart. The sobs shook her body as she confessed it all, her most horrible secret.

"I killed Bellatrix Lestrange and I liked it. I liked it!" She had turned to him and she was shouting. "I stood over her and I felt pleasure! I was happy that I'd killed her!" Her voice dropped now to a whisper. "I'm no different then her." Hermione felt tainted, stained somehow with the knowledge that she could kill and enjoy it. She expected Snape to tell her that it didn't matter, that it was alright, that Bellatrix had deserved it. But he did not. Instead he spoke very quietly.

"You _are_ no different than her." He said.

Hermione stared at him, shocked by this confirmation.

"But-" He held a hand under her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes. "We are _all_ like her. We are all capable of such savagery. You just saw in yourself what most people never have the opportunity to see."

Hermione shook her head. "How can I live like this?" She asked at last.

He shrugged. "Because you must." He had no comfort to offer, no clever words of support or condolence. There was only that bald statement. _You must go on_.

Snape's hand was still cupping her chin and Hermione took it in her own and turned back to the fire.

They sat like that until the embers burned low, his hand in hers, not talking but understanding each other perfectly.

_Beloved gaze in thine own heart_

_A holy tree is growing there_

_From joy the holy branches start_

_And all the trembling flowers they bear_

_The changing colors of it fruit_

_Have dulled the stars with merry light_

_The surety of it's hidden root_

_It planted quiet in the night_

_The shaking of its leafy head_

_Has given the waves their melody_

_And made my lips and music wed_

_Murmuring a wizard's song for thee_.

The Two Trees, William Butler Yeats


End file.
